Gaston, Count of Eu
Prince Gaston of Orléans, Count of Eu was a French prince of the House of Orléans and a career military officer. He is best known for his service as a senior commander in the Hispano-Moroccan War and for his prominent role in the Paraguayan War, where he commanded Allied forces during the final phase of the conflict. Born into the French royal family as the eldest son of Louis, Duke of Nemours and Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Gaston later became a central figure in Brazilian imperial history through his marriage to Princess Isabel, daughter and heir of Pedro II of Brazil. As prince consort to the heiress presumptive, he played a significant role in the political, military, and dynastic affairs of the Empire of Brazil during its final decades.
Early years
Gaston was born Louis Philippe Marie Ferdinand Gaston of Orléans on 28 April 1842 in Neuilly-sur-Seine, a suburb of Paris, at the Château de Neuilly. He was the eldest son of Louis, the Duke of Nemours and Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. His paternal grandparents were King Louis Philippe I, King of the French, and Maria Amalia of the Two Sicilies, and his maternal grandparents were Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha and Princess Maria Antonia von Koháry.A member of the French royal family, Gaston belonged to the House of Orléans, a cadet branch of the House of Bourbon, that in turn belonged to the Capetian dynasty. A Prince of Orléans, he was titled Count of Eu at birth by his grandfather, King Louis Philippe.
He was a first cousin once removed of both the British Monarch Queen Victoria and of her husband Albert, Prince Consort, through his mother, Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha.
The prince received a refined education under Julio Gauthier and the historian Auguste Trognon. He learned several foreign languages, which included Latin, English, German and Portuguese.
His grandfather abdicated during the Revolution of 1848. Only five years old at the time, Gaston followed the king and his family who went into exile in Great Britain, establishing themselves in an old mansion at Claremont, in the southern region of England.
In 1855, at the age of 13, Gaston began his military career in an artillery course, concluding in the Military School of Segovia, Spain, where he became a captain. He had moved to Spain, after following his uncle, Antoine, the Duke of Montpensier's orientation. The Duke had lived there since his marriage to Infanta Luisa Fernanda, sister of Queen Isabel II of Spain.
Isabel, Princess Imperial of Brazil
After years with problems on the border with Morocco caused by constant attacks on Spanish cities by Moroccan pirates, Spain declared war on Morocco. The young Gaston was sent as a subordinate officer to participate in the conflict on the side of the Spanish forces. The Spanish military consisted of more than 40,000 soldiers, while the Moroccan troops numbered about 140,000 men. The Count participated in all of the battles, and after the end of the conflict he returned to Spain with a reputation for his military prowess.A few years later, his uncle, King Ferdinand II of Portugal proposed that he should marry one of the two daughters of the Emperor Pedro II of Brazil. He agreed to accept the proposal, but only after meeting the princesses. The Emperor's sister, Princess Francisca, who was married to the Count's uncle, the Prince of Joinville, wrote a letter to her brother describing the Count. "If you could grab this one for one of your daughters it would be excellent. He is robust, high, handsome, good natured, very amiable, much instructed, studious, and in addition, he possesses now a small military fame."
Gaston arrived in Rio de Janeiro on 2 September 1864 in the company of his double first cousin, Prince Ludwig August of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, and went directly to the Palace of São Cristóvão to meet the Brazilian imperial family. However, Gaston was less than enthusiastic about the two princesses, whom he considered unattractive. Initially, the young Count was promised to Princess Leopoldina and his cousin to Princess Isabel. However, after getting to know them better, the Emperor decided to invert the pairs. Gaston became attached to Isabel. They were married on 15 October 1864. Earlier, Gaston was awarded the Grand Cross of the Imperial Order of the Southern Cross and a few days later accepted the honorary presidency of the Brazilian Geographic and Historical Institute.
In 1892, Alfredo d'Escragnolle, Vicomte de Taunay, gave his opinion regarding the two cousins when they first arrived in Brazil. He said that the duke of Saxe "had only interest in spending his life in a lazy and amusing way, he liked a lot of hunting and appreciated a lot the many joys that existed in Europe, while the comte d'Eu with all the defects that I can point at him, cared sincerely and a lot for Brazil and, believe it or not, he still loves it today with intensity and no second intention."
Paraguayan War
Gaston and Isabel were travelling in Europe on their honeymoon when Paraguayan forces invaded the Brazilian provinces of Mato Grosso and Rio Grande Do Sul. From the city of Uruguaiana in the southern region of Brazil, Pedro II sent a letter to the couple requesting Gaston's presence in Brazil, directing the Count to join him and the Brazilian army, together with the Duke of Saxe.Uruguaiana had been conquered by the Paraguayan army. The Conde d'Eu, and the Emperor, Pedro II of Brazil, joined President Bartolomé Mitre of Argentina in the Siege of Uruguaiana, which ended 18 September 1865.
In his memoirs, the Viscount of Taunay wrote of his experience in the Paraguayan War, along with observances of his fellow soldiers. "While Gaston showed in all occasions a great interest for the things of Brazil, observing, asking, visiting all the places and going after correct and accurate information, while the other did not show anything except for indifference and lack of ambition." He was later nominated general commander of the artillery and president of the Commission of Improvements of the Army on 19 November 1865.
On two occasions throughout the conflict, Gaston sent requests to the Emperor asking him to authorize his participation in the war against Paraguay. The Council of State declined his request. The rationale was a strategic act, believing that the presence of a prince in the conflict would escalate the desire to conquer their country's territories. Additionally, it was unacceptable for the husband of the heiress of the throne to subordinate to a Brazilian military officer, who, at this time, was Luis Alves de Lima and Silva, the Marquis of Caxias, the just-nominated allied commander-in-chief.
On 22 March 1869, Gaston was assigned to lead as commander-in-chief of the allied armies, after the Marquis of Caxias renounced that position. This delegation of authority was based on the prestige as an officer of high rank, as well as his reputation and well-known capacity in military action.
The choice of Gaston as the new commander-in-chief, at the age of 27, brought joy to the Brazilian public. During this time a great number of Brazilian believed that the conflict and continued hunt for Francisco Solano López, the Paraguayan dictator, was futile and unnecessary. Gaston shared this belief. When he arrived at Paraguay, he reorganized the Brazilian army and fired the officers accused of pillage in enemy territory.
He used diversified tactics to deceive the Paraguayan army about how and where the allied army would carry its attacks. In the opinion of the Viscount of Taunay, Gaston showed "great strategical ability, cool temper, patience of an experienced leader and unquestionable courage." He also participated actively in the battles that occurred, in the Battle of Acosta Ñu, where he suffered great risk of life. It was the Count's idea to definitively extinguish the slavery of approximately 25,000 individuals in Paraguay, many of whom were obliged to fight in the war against the Triple Alliance.
Gaston suffered heavy criticism after he discovered that the brigadier João Manuel Mena Barreto had died in the battle that resulted in the conquest of the village of Piribebuy which at that time was named "the third capital of Paraguay" after the occupation of Asunción and Luque earlier in 1868. He was also criticized for ordering the decapitation of commander Pedro Pablo Caballero and Patricio Marecos, head politician of the village. In September, the Count became greatly depressed, due to the high number of deaths caused by the conflict. Until the end of the war on 1 March 1870, he participated nominally in the action of the allied army. When he returned to Brazil on 29 April 1870, he was received as a war hero. He was also nominated as a member of the Council of State on 6 July of the same year.
Modern critics of Gaston d'Orléans in the war
After the 1960s, revisionist historians appeared, portraying the Gaston d'Orléans as a bloodthirsty mass murderer. Some historians, like Júlio Jose Chiavenato, accuse him of having committed war crimes and being most interested in engaging in war, if only to pursue López. Revisionist historians also accuse Gaston of having ordered a grass fire, in order to asphyxiate wounded Paraguayan soldiers who were still in the field after the battle of Acosta Ñu. Chiavenato uses as a source, the memoirs of the Viscount of Taunay.Recently, it has been found that the memoirs say something completely different. "There were bullets that still blew up in the field because of the fire in the grass that was started in the beginning of the battle by the Paraguayans to occult their tactical movement." There is a mention of an episode, where Gaston ordered the troops to set fire in a hospital full of wounded Paraguayan soldiers that resulted in the death of more than a hundred victims. However, the hospital may have been collateral damage caused by allied bombardment at the beginning of the battle, directed on the Paraguayan military defense and not as the result of a deliberate desire of killing defenseless people.